How much money would it take to make you feel wealthy? What is wealth? What is money? These are just some of the mind-bending questions raised by the results of a new Charles Schwab Corp. survey taken way back in Ye Olden Times of February.
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In a bit of a head-scratcher, the survey found that people think it takes $2.2 million in net worth to be “wealthy,” down from $2.6 million in 2020, just before the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic. Survey respondents think it takes $774,000 to be “comfortable,” which is down from $934,000.
Given that consumer price inflation has soared from about 2% year-over-year before the pandemic to roughly 8% now, you might think people would need more cash to feel “wealthy,” “comfortable” or “able to buy milk.” Then again, maybe the pandemic has made us lower our sights a bit. Perhaps all it takes to feel wealthy now is an RV, a pleasant Zoom background, maybe a home office on the French Riviera.
In fact, the Schwab survey also found many respondents highly value, uh, values when considering employment. More than half said they’d take a lower-paying job for a company that “better represents personal values or interests.” Of course, my personal values and interests include a home office on the French Riviera, so your mileage may vary here.
Still, 89% of respondents said they wanted fulfilling work, 85% said they wanted the respect of their colleagues and 84% said values guided their career. Lest you think such numbers merely reflect the attitudes of so many woke Millennials, consider that Gen X and Baby Boomers together made up 56% of survey respondents.
So maybe money really is slightly less important these days. And from a global perspective, you could say $2.2 million is still exorbitant, considering the median global income is roughly $12,000. Teen grocery clerks — or at least the ones not yet replaced by self-checkout machines — in America might be considered wealthy, or at least comfortable, by such standards.
Read the full article here by Mark Gongloff, Advisor Perspectives.
